Stories of Mommy
by Alhazred the Mad
Summary: Ashitaka telling his daughter stories of the mother she never knew. Rated T just to be safe. One shot, A/S. I think I need to put a fluff warning here... Im not great with summaries, but please read. And reviews are much appreciated.


Right. I saw PM the other day. Fell in love with Ashitaka's and San's story. Always felt it was a little incomplete. So here ya go. My first fan fic ever.  
Disclaimer: I do not own Princess Mononoke.

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"Daddy, Daddy!" little Morrow called as she ran into the living room.  
Her father laughed. She liked it when he laughed. It made her heart feel warm.  
She ran over to where he sat in the rocking chair and climbed up onto his lap and  
threw her arms around his neck. He laughed even harder, now.  
"What is it, Morrow?" her father asked as she seemed to calm down.  
"Tell me a story about Mommy!" Her father smiled and his eyes seemed  
be distant for a moment. Then his smile found her and she gave him a toothy grin,  
which made him laugh again. She loved it when he laughed.

"Alright, my child. I'll tell you about the last day I saw your mother."  
He positioned her on his knee so that she could see him speak without turning.  
"Your mother and I had been running through the forest all night. You see we had been  
looking for the head of the Forest Spirit."  
"Did he lose it?" little Morrow asked, growing nervous.  
"Not quite, dear. A misguided man took it without asking him. And this made  
the forest spirit very sad. So sad, that he began to hurt the trees looking for the man  
with his head."  
"Oh, no!" Morrow cried as she began to imagine the trees crying out in pain.  
"So your mother and I decided to help the Forest Spirit," her father said.  
"We ran and ran and ran. We eventually found him, but we had to fight a few  
nasty men to keep up with him."  
Morrow gasped. "Did they hurt you?" Her father laughed, a reassuring sound.  
"No, my child, try as they might, they were too slow for your mother and I.  
After making it past those men, we caught up to the man with the Forest Spirits head.  
We begged him to let us give the Forest Spirit his head back, for if he did not,  
the Forest would be destroyed."  
"That mean, nasty ol' man!" Morrow cried, thumping her own knee for emphasis.  
Ashitaka looked his daughter soberly in the eye and said, "Now Morrow. What have I told you about  
people who do bad things?"  
Morrow sighed and held her shoulders up and her head high as if ready to recite  
words that had been fed to her for years upon years. Even though she had only known  
seven.  
"Begrudge the deed, not the committer," she said slowly.  
"That's right. You see, we eventually persuaded the man to give us the head, so that we might  
give it to the Forest Spirit. And you know what?"  
"What?" Morrow asked, getting excited.  
"The Forest Spirit stood the trees back up,  
and forgave the man who stole his head!" her father said enthusiastically.  
Morrow jumped from her fathers knee, hooting and hollering  
various "Yays!" and "Hoorays!"  
Her father laughed and said, "That's not all, Morrow."  
Morrow climbed back up to her fathers knee and waited intently for him to continue.

"After that your mother and I lay in a field. It was that very day that  
I told your mother I loved her. In fact, when I did, your mother turned all  
red and told me she loved me too."  
Ashitaka took his daughter by the waist and lifted her into the air.  
"And with a kiss," he said planting one on her cheek, "We decided to have  
a daughter." Morrow wiped her cheek off with her hands in mock disgust. "Ew!"  
Her father laughed.

He sat back down, resting her on his knee. "After that, she told me that  
she needed to see to the forest for a while, so she wouldn't be able to  
see me very much. I told her that I needed to help rebuild Iron Town, so  
I would be busy as well."  
"What happened next?" Morrow asked, absorbed in the story.  
Her father smiled. "Your mother told me that I meant very much to her.  
And I told her that I would visit as often as possible. So, once a month, I  
would venture into the forest to visit her. And for the first two months,  
everything was wonderful." His voice trailed slightly at the end.  
"What about later?" Morrow asked, concerned.  
"What was that, my dear?" her father asked, his reverie broken.  
"What happened later, Daddy?" she repeated.

"Oh. Well, when I went to visit your mother in the third month,  
I couldn't find her. I ran through the forest for hours, and there was no trace  
of her or her brothers." His eyes got big and glossy, like a table that had just been  
cleaned.  
"I came back every day for three months, but I couldn't find her. So I stopped."  
"Why did you stop searching, Daddy?" Morrow asked, upset that her father gave up.  
Then her father did something she didn't expect. He smiled down at her, and a single  
tear rolled down his cheek. "Because I thought she didn't love me anymore."

After a few moments, he wiped his eyes and continued.  
"Well, about three months after I stopped searching, I came home one night  
to find a bundle on my steps. And guess what was in it?"  
"Me!" Morrow said throwing her arms into the air, laughing hysterically.  
Her father laughed, "Yes, love, it was you."  
"I knew right away that you must have been our daughter, because I could see  
her eyes on you right away. That's one of the things I miss most about your mother."  
"Was Mommy pretty?" Morrow asked her father.  
"Oh boy, she was," he said. His eyes were looking at her, but now they weren't  
really _looking _at her.  
"Your mother was the most beautiful woman I've ever known. The world could be  
burning down, fire raining from the sky. And you would still lose yourself in those eyes…  
Darker than the earth of the Forest, they were. So dark, so deep…"  
He seemed to be lost now.

Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. Morrow looked up at her father and asked,  
"Can I answer the door, Daddy?" Her father smiled. "You sure can, Morrow."  
Morrow hopped from her fathers knee and ran to the door.  
She opened it to find a woman standing there. Her hair was dark brown.  
She was tall, and slender. There was an intense look on her face. Her skin was  
so white that she nearly glowed.  
"Hello, pretty lady!" Morrow said. The woman looked down at Morrow.  
She wore a white fur coat that was now completely soaked  
due to the rain that had been falling all day.  
"Morrow!" her father called from inside. "Let our guest inside, its pouring out there!"  
"Alright, Daddy!" Morrow called over her shoulder. She turned back to the woman.  
"Please come inside." She moved out of the way for the woman, who only hesitated  
for a moment before entering.  
Once she had shut the door, she ran back to her father.  
He was standing now, staring at the woman who had just entered their home.  
Morrow looked up at her father trying to get his attention. He was scaring her.  
She clenched a handful of his shirt, "Daddy, what it is?"  
After hearing that, her father smiled again. Tears began to roll down his face.  
He was still staring at her. Morrow looked over at the woman.  
The woman was staring at _her!_ And she was… crying?

Ashitaka picked his daughter up and cradled her in his arms, as he would a younger child.  
"Hello, guest."  
The woman choked slightly on her own words before managing to say, "Hello."  
"Do you know who this is?" Morrow looked over to the woman. The woman shook  
her head. He smiled, the tears falling faster down his face. 'Why is Daddy crying?' Morrow  
asked herself.  
"This," he said, "is Morrow."  
The woman gasped, and, falling to her knees, crying turned sobbing.  
After a few minutes, "May I… May I hold her?"  
Ashitaka put his daughter down, and knelt so he could see her eye to eye.  
"Morrow, this nice lady is very sad. Can you hug her and help her to feel better?"  
Her father was on the verge of crying out himself, she could see that. But if he wanted her to…  
She smiled up at him.  
"Yes, Daddy." She turned and walked over to the woman, wrapping her arms around her.  
The woman, in turn, threw her arms around Morrows waist.  
Morrow could still see her face, however. She was still crying, but it couldn't have been because  
she was sad like her Daddy said… because….  
She was smiling.


End file.
